Turn the Cherries to Glenbuck gold
Ghost village team in new bid for fame
Football and Glenbuck used to go together like peaches and cream.
It was the birthplace of legendary Liverpool manager Bill Shankly and spawned an incredible 54 professional players despite a population of little more than 1000 at its peak.
Descendants of the Cherrypickers, Shankly’s family and Liverpool supporters’ group the Spirit of Shankly are promoting the cause.
Michele Palilla and fellow campaigners Ben Browning, Robert Gillan and Sam Purdie want the Cherrypickers to be inducted into the Scottish Football Hall of Fame.
Normally the preserve of great players and managers, the group are campaigning for them to be remembered as one of Scottish football’s greatest stories.
Glenbuck produced seven Scotland internationalists including Shankly, Sandy Brown and Sandy Tait, both of whom went on to sign for Tottenham Hotspur, where they won the FA Cup in 1901.
Brown brought the trophy to Glenbuck where it spent two days in the coal village, long since bulldozed into oblivion.
Another alumnus is Bob Shankly, Bill’s brother and a former manager of Hibs, Falkirk and Dundee, where they won the league in 1962.
Michele is serious about his Hall of Fame campaign.
He said: “A few weeks past we went to Hampden to meet Richard McBrearty, who is the curator of the Scottish football museum.
“He was interested and the campaign is going well. We set up a Twitter account and a Facebook page and there has been lots of interest.”
The deadline for nominations was Friday and a panel will make a recommendation.”
Michele, 41, said: “I knew about Scottish football growing up. Dalglish, Law, Souness, Bremner – the country had some of the best players in the world.
“I love football history and visited Cathkin Park before becoming president of Third Lanark.
“Living in Ayrshire, I heard about the Cherrypickers. I love their story, it’s one of the best I’ve ever heard.”
There may be little left of Glenbuck save for Shankly’s memorial, the gates to the village and an overgrown area that was once the field of dreams for the village miners.
Michele and his friends are planning to restore the ground to its former glory and launch an amateur team.
Shankly’s niece Barbara Alexander is happy to spread the gospel of her legendary uncle, the Cherrypickers and the place she called home.
She said: “I left Glenbuck in 1971 and never returned until I unveiled the plaque to my Uncle Willie years later.
“When I left there was little remaining of the village – no church, no shop, no school – just eight council houses. Now the council and the miner restoration group are planning to revamp the land – try to make it look a little like how it used to appear.
“It was a poor place but it was a community. The fact people were so poor was the reason for producing so many players. There was nothing else to do except go down the pits. The only way out was through the football.”